


Written in the Stars

by ageekofalltrades



Category: Chronicles of Narnia - All Media Types, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Crossover, F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-10-01
Updated: 2017-10-01
Packaged: 2019-01-07 16:49:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,578
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12236829
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ageekofalltrades/pseuds/ageekofalltrades
Summary: They're both in mourning for people they've lost.  Can Susan show the Doctor that there's still beauty in the universe?  Can the Doctor take her back to the one place she longs to go, but can't bring herself to ask about?





	Written in the Stars

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by Carrie Underwood's song "There's a Place for Us"

The perfect weather seemed to mock Susan as she finally arrived at her destination. She weaved her way across the ground, clenching the flowers she held even tighter. After a year, she knew the path all too well. 

“Hello you lot,” she whispered once she finally reached the row of stones. One by one she placed the small bouquets in front of each headstone. “Mum. Dad. Pete. Ed. Lu.” She named them all, as she always did, greeting every member of her family that was buried in front of her. One year. It had been one year since she had become the last Pevensie. One year since the train accident.

“I miss you all,” Susan said as she sank down to kneel in front of her siblings. “It’s...this past year hasn’t been easy. But I think you know that. At least I’m not wholed up in my room anymore.” She attempted a smile. “I finally went back to the house; it was time. Don’t worry Mum, I had someone keeping it up. I don’t know what I’ll end up doing with the house. It’s too big for me alone. But I’m back there for now. Everything still looks the same.”

She paused, gazing at three of the gravestones. In the bottom corner of each one, she had painstakingly carved words into the stone. She wasn’t sure if they were real, if the words had ever really belonged to them, but it had felt like the right thing to do; the right way to honor her siblings properly. The Magnificent. The Just. The Valiant. 

She wiped absently at the tears that had started to fall. She started to trace over those words, wondering for the umpteenth time if that had all been a dream. The trees, the beach, the fields. The…

She turned her head at a sudden noise that didn’t belong in the graveyard. She had never heard anything like it: a wheezing, creaking sort of moan. But it was also sort of mechanical?

She looked around, trying to pinpoint where it was coming from. Then, in the next row over, a shape started taking form. A box-like shape. Right before her eyes, a blue Police Box, of all things, appeared. And then, the doors opened.

“No, no, no! What have you done? Why would you bring me _here_? Anywhere else, you could have taken me anywhere else! The Court of Henry VIII, the moons of Iego; I would settle for Barcelona the actual city! How could you do this to me?” the gangly man shouted as he slammed the door behind him. He looked ready to storm off, but then he realized that he wasn’t alone and the anger drained away from him.

“Oh, hello. I didn’t realize...I didn’t mean to interrupt. Don’t mind me; I’ll just -” he pointed back at the box behind him.

“But you...that wasn’t there a moment ago,” Susan said slowly, looking back and forth between the man and the box.

“No. I was trying to go somewhere else. Anywhere else. But she brought me here, and I don’t know why,” he added, glaring behind him at the box.

“She?”

“My ship,” the stranger explained, gesturing at the box behind him. “We could have gone anywhere, anywhere! But no, you had to bring me to the one place I specifically asked you not to go to!” This last statement was directed back at the blue box...ship?

But even as he shouted it, Susan understood. At least, in part. “Maybe...she thought it time for you to mourn.”

The man whirled around. “You couldn’t possibly - “ he began to accuse.

“Understand? Oh, but I do,” Susan said as she rose to her feet and waved a hand towards the row of headstones. “I am now the last of my family. Trust me, I understand a great deal. So take my word for it: having the time to mourn is important.”

The man’s expression slowly softened at Susan’s words, eyes following the sweep of her hand. “I’m sorry,” he said softly. “What’s your name?”

In the presence of her siblings, she had to struggle to answer simply. “Susan. Susan Pevensie. And you are?”

“I’m the Doctor.”

“Doctor...who?” Susan prompted.

The man - the Doctor - answered with a tiny smile. “Just the Doctor.”

Susan nodded slowly. The Doctor was an odd choice for a name, but no more so than Mr. and Mrs. Bea - no, best not to go there. “So, Doctor, if you weren’t wanting to come here, where were you trying to go?”

The Doctor glanced back at the box - his ship - again, a bigger smile on his face now (even though it didn’t quite meet his eyes). “That’s the beauty of the TARDIS; you can go anywhere.”

“The TARDIS?”

“Time And Relative Dimension In Space,” the Doctor responded, as though that ought to be answer enough.

Another strange name, even for a ship. But then she focused on what he actually said, and…”Did you say _time_?”

The Doctor clenched his hands into fists. “I did. I could go have tea with Queen Victoria, or go see the first pyramid being built. I’m a Time Lord; I’ve seen civilizations rise and fall. But I can’t…” He glanced behind her at the gravestones. “Some things can’t be rewritten.” 

Susan was ready to tell him that it could, that she had seen the Deep Magic do wonders. But that was a different lifetime. Instead, she placed a hand on the nearest headstone: Peter’s. “No. No, some things can’t be rewritten. That’s the price we pay, I suppose.”

The Doctor studied her for a moment, seemingly searching for something.

“Tell me, Susan Pevensie, if you could go anywhere - anywhere in time and space - where would you go?”

Susan’s throat closed up before she could even speak the name. He was asking a serious question, that much she could tell; it deserved a serious answer.

She glanced back at what parts of the city she could see from here, thought of all the noise and hustle. She compared it to the calm and the peace she remembered. _They used to dance,_ Lucy’s voice whispered.

“The forest. Any forest, anywhere,” she answered. “Do you know of a good one?”

_The only water in the forest is the river._ “I know of a few. There’s a whole forest-planet I’ve been meaning to go back to.”

“That’s where I would go. I’d go watch the sun rise over the trees. It’s peaceful.”

The Doctor grinned, a better smile this time. He held out a hand and snapped his fingers and Susan watched in fascination as one of the doors of the TARDIS swung open. “Well then, what are we waiting for?”

“We?” Susan repeated, staring through the door. She could make out...something. Lights? But where was the back of the box? A strange feeling settled in the pit of her stomach.

“Why not?” the Doctor inquired. “If you’re worried about other obligations...I do have a time machine. I can get you back in time.”

Susan took a step forwards before she was aware of making the decision to do so. A sense of something filled the air. Excitement? Adventure? Anticipation? “Is it...I mean, what’s in there?”

“Only one way to find out,” the Doctor said challengingly. 

Right then. Squaring her shoulders, Susan strode through the door, unsure if she would be devastated or understanding if she didn’t see…

Well.

Whatever she had or had not been expecting to see, it certainly wasn’t this. Instead of the back of the box, it was a whole other room. (And her logical side was trying to piece together how it all fit while her imaginative side whispered that they had seen this before. Spare Oom.) Things were whirring and beeping and she didn’t even recognize 80 percent of the technology. “It’s…”

“Go on, say it, I’ve heard it all before,” the Doctor said as he came up beside her. The door of the TARDIS was still open, giving her a way out if she wanted it.

“It’s no wardrobe,” she blurted out before she could stop herself.

The Doctor’s brow furrowed. “Well, no. It’s a police telephone box. Well, it’s disguised as one anyway. I suppose it could be a wardrobe if the chameleon circut wasn’t jammed, but - “

“No, it’s fine,” Susan interrupted. “I don’t know why I said that.” Lie. “It’s just that it’s bigger on the inside! This should be impossible!”

“There we go!” the Doctor exclaimed, dashing towards the center of the...control room? “Nothing wrong with a bit of familiarity!” He started pulling levers and pushing buttons. “So yes or no; do you still want to see that forest?”

Susan glanced back out through the door, her family’s final resting place still in sight. To be free of the city that still held so many painful memories...she wouldn’t call it running away. More like she was running towards something else. Something familiar, perhaps? Something better. And she would come back; this wasn’t permanent. Just one trip, to see how true the Doctor’s words of time and space were.

She nodded, moving further into the TARDIS. The door closed behind her.

“Right, okay! Come along Po - Pevensie.” The Doctor stuttered over his words before hurrying on. “Right, I’ll think of something better.” 

One final pull of a lever had the TARDIS shuddering around them, and the strange noise from before filled the air.


End file.
